This summer, we explored the comic play - how does comedy work? We considered comedy technique - in acting and obviously in directing. Technique. That such a thing exists. That there might be nothing "stylized" or "artificial" about it, that great comic acting and directing is organic, timed and finely executed. What plays do we find funny? What, historically, are the great comic plays from our traditions? What is the state of comedy today in the theater? Does comedy - from Aristophanes, Shakespeare, to Gogol, to French farce, to Brecht farces, to classic American comedies, to Joe Orton, to Dario Fo and Pieter Dirk Uys - have a political element, right or left? is comedy "cheery" or does it share elements of violence with other fare? What is great comic acting? How to direct comedy?

Other Sessions:
A week with Christopher Bayes, Head of Physical Acting, Yale School of Drama
Discussion with Pam MacKinnon and Crystal A. Dickinson
Discussion with George C. Wolfe
Discussion with Christopher Durang
Discussion with Dr. Penzer, Psychoanalyst
Discussion with Bill Irwin
Visits to see CLYBOURNE PARK, FELA, WAR HORSE, and UNCLE VANYA.

TWELFTH NIGHT by William Shakespeare
WE WON'T PAY! WE WON'T PAY! by Dario Fo
A Commedia Dell'Arte Selection by Flaminio Scala
MULE BONE by Langston Hughes & Zora Neale Hurston
LION OF THE WEST by James Kirk Paulding
PARALLEL LIVES by Kathy Najami & Mo Gaffney
WAITING FOR GODOT by Samuel Beckett
A DOCTOR IN SPITE OF HIMSELF by Moliere
MEIN KAMPF by George Tabori
THE CLOUDS by Aristophanes
ALONE WORLD by Carl Kissin & Rob Baumgarten
THE ACTOR'S NIGHTMARE by Christopher Durang
THE COLORED MUSEUM by George C. Wolfe
THE LIEUTENANT OF INISHMORE by Martin McDonagh